You are here

Schwartz gets 29 more years

Theodore "Toby" Schwartz entered Adams Circuit Court on Monday afternoon with a 100-year prison sentence and left about an hour later with 29 years added on.
Schwartz, 41, a former resident of Geneva and Berne, was given a century behind bars last year in Allen County for rape, burglary, and other crimes in the fall of 2009 that resulted from his lengthy use of methamphetamine.
He pleaded guilty on Monday before Judge Frederick A. Schurger to possession of meth and escape from police on August 11, 2009, in Berne, and to being an habitual substance offender. Two charges were dismissed: escape and dealing in meth.
Schwartz is also scheduled to be sentenced on Thursday, February 17, in Wells County for crimes there on the same say as the Allen County incidents, including stealing a vehicle, robbing a business in Ossian, and resisting law enforcement.
Adams County Prosecutor Chris Harvey, who requested the extra 29 years, noted that Schwartz has been in trouble with the law since age 18 and has amassed 11 felony convictions, primarily for drug and alcohol use, plus eight misdemeanor convictions.
Harvey noted that Schwartz was manufacturing meth in a house in Berne across the street from an elementary school playground — while he was on home detention.
The prosecutor said Schwartz is "soft-spoken and respectful" when he is not using drugs or alcohol, but is dangerous when he does use those substances.
Schwartz's lawyer, Stanley "Skip" Campbell of Fort Wayne, asked the judge to run the sentences concurrently with the 100-year Allen County prison term, noting that, if the Allen County sentence is unchanged on appeal, Schwartz will not be eligible for parole until 2060, at age 90.
"There isn't much more that can happen to him," said Campbell, adding that his client's addiction to meth "pretty much destroyed his life" as he ran up a $100,000 credit card debt and engaged in varied criminal behavior.